What happens to Liberal Media if Trump Wins? Will Media Bias Backfire?

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If we awake on November 9 to news that Donald Trump will be the next President of the United States, where does that leave the most biased media in the history of American political campaigns?

This was the year for coming out of the closet by the media, not in terms of sexual preference, but in terms of ideology and tactics.

It took a long time for them to wake up to the Hillary Clinton vulnerabilities as there was never a doubt in the minds of the main street media that she would continue the cozy sweetheart relationship between the media and the liberal and progressive politicians.

As President Barack Obama comes to the twilight of his run as president, the media expected to transition into a Hillary presidency surrounded by all the people in the Establishment from past years.

The possibility that Trump could be a viable candidate for president never crossed the minds of the media when they helped create the Trump tidal wave that swept all the legitimate (in the minds of the media) GOP contenders from the race

They dreamed of a match up between the vaunted and feared Clinton machine that has controlled the news media and Democratic Party for twenty-four years and the oddball from Trump Tower, the Donald.

Well they got it and no one has learned the lesson better than the news media, be very careful what you wish for because you may not get what you expect.

In a state of panic since the Democratic National Convention that nominated Hillary as she failed to crush the GOP upstart and put Trump away, they seem paralyzed with fear she really might lose.

If it happens, the transformation in the news media in a Trump administration may be just as cataclysmic as the fading legacy of Obama when Trump focuses the light on the real failures of the Obama administration while president.

Many media personalities crossed the line in journalistic ethics by using their media positions to promote Hillary and destroy Trump.

Bias has dominated the media coverage of the campaign and the role of individual anchors, reporters, producers, and editors made a mockery of the journalistic ethics that call for an independent and objective media when operating under the protection of the Constitution.

There is a definite liberal progressive dominance in the news media, very inconsistent with the middle of the road philosophy the people of America share.  The Obama politics of partisanship, promises, and pandering fell flat though he was the first media-anointed candidate for president.

Unfortunately, for the liberal media, Bill and Hillary Clinton long ago figured out how to use the news media, Democrats, and liberal progressive wing to make a fortune.  Long ago, they joined the one-half of one percent elite establishment controlling the country and world.

That is the face of the darlings of the news media.  That is not what the American public wants to see and hear.  So if Trump wins, what happens to the news media?

Will Trump abolish the White House Press Corp, as unlike the Clinton and Obama families who mastered the use of political power to manipulate the media, Trump neither drinks nor likes to hang out with media?

Will the new Trump administration conclude self-serving news networks no longer serve the best interests of the public because they filter news, not report it.  As a result, the members of the Trump administration will no longer participate in news shows not serving the public interest no matter if they are on NBC, ABC, CBS, Fox, MSNBC, CNN, PBS, etc.

Will Trump welcome the foreign press correspondents to briefings instead of the political press in order to get honest information to foreign countries highlighting American involvement in world affairs?

Perhaps Trump will institute an entirely new concept in news coverage of the White House by having regional news conferences instead of national to avoid the control and filtering of the New York and Washington, DC media over national news.

Trump could also eliminate public information offices in all the departments, especially State, Justice, and Defense, and consolidate the communications under the Office of the President thus greatly reducing the leaking of classified or confidential information by the highly competitive departments.  It would also eliminate the use and abuse by media of secret or anonymous sources "inside" the departments.

As I said, I hope the media knows what could happen, if the efforts to create a media bias against Trump or any other opponent to Hillary Clinton fail.  There are consequences.

A genie jumped out of a bottle and asked the master for his wish.

I wish there was no more sickness in the world.

Your Thoughtful wish is granted master.

Every sick person in the world dropped dead.

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American Elections 3 - Tips for International Followers - The Media Machine and Promoting News with Bias

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Anyone who has lived in or visited America has most likely witnessed the power of the media, the bias of the media, and the elitist attitude of America's Fourth Estate.

About 227 years ago, on September 25, 1789, the First Congress of the United States proposed 12 amendments to the Constitution.  Ten of the proposed 12 amendments were ratified by three-fourths of the state legislatures on December 15, 1791. The ratified Articles (Articles 3–12) constitute the first 10 amendments of the Constitution, or the U.S. Bill of Rights.  In 1992, 203 years after it was proposed, Article 2 was ratified as the 27th Amendment to the Constitution. Article 1 failed ratification.

Here is the exact text of the original third amendment, which eventually became the first amendment to the Constitution.

"Article the third... Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

Now if ever there was a doubt as to the power of the press the first amendment to the Constitution should end the discussion.  In that action, two special interests received special rights and protection in America, religion and the press.  A third interest, the people, received a guarantee of free speech, the right to assembly, and the right to petition the government.

If our Founding Fathers could see the maze and mess of the media today one wonders if such special rights would exist.  Back then there were only newspapers and magazines, and current news could be a week and often far longer before it reached you.

The instantaneous nature of news today with the bias and lack of fact checking inherent in it, while broadcasting such a cacophony of dribble and drabble through radio and television would be enough to put Ben Franklin in a premature grave.  Add to that confusion the explosion of the Internet and the competition between everyone to control it, and the Founding Fathers would probably give us back to Great Britain.

So today, we are stuck with a New World media.  Once upon a time, the media in America had "ethics," "standards," and rules to assure "objectivity."  In fact all members of the traditional or Main Street media, meaning those who existed in the era of print, radio, and television, agreed to establish a Society of Professional Journalists and adopted a Code of Ethics in 1909.

Here is a summary of the Code.

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SPJ Code of Ethics

Preamble

Members of the Society of Professional Journalists believe that public enlightenment is the forerunner of justice and the foundation of democracy. Ethical journalism strives to ensure the free exchange of information that is accurate, fair and thorough. An ethical journalist acts with integrity.

The Society declares these four principles as the foundation of ethical journalism and encourages their use in its practice by all people in all media.

Seek Truth and Report It

Ethical journalism should be accurate and fair. Journalists should

be honest and courageous in gathering, reporting and interpreting

information.

Minimize Harm

Ethical journalism treats sources, subjects, colleagues and members of

the public as human beings deserving of respect.

Act Independently

The highest and primary obligation of ethical journalism is to serve

the public.

Be Accountable and Transparent

Ethical journalism means taking responsibility for one's work and

explaining one’s decisions to the public.

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Well, it was a great idea in 1909 but largely ignored in every presidential election cycle since until this year, 2016, when any such binding Code of Ethics for journalists seems to have disappeared off the face of the Earth.

This year the American media has demonstrated an elitist attitude, a contempt for the people of America, a disdain for seeking the truth, and they despise many of the political candidates.  In short, ethics in the media is long gone.

Yet it is okay in this tumultuous election cycle because the candidates themselves have also bent the rules of decorum and obliterated any political correctness in the process.

As an advocate of the Lincoln approach to our system of government, an approach Honest Abe discussed in his First Inaugural Address Monday, March 4, 1861, here are his own words.

"The government, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it."

Not only did he have 1861 in mind when he spoke those prophetic words, he was speaking for an America 155 years into the future, the year 2016, and the presidential election "revolution" that is underway.

What Abraham Lincoln foresaw as a possibility when the government, politicians, and special interests took control and ignored the will of the people, has materialized today.

The signs were there but the perpetrators including the media, politicians, and the establishment were blind to them.  Every poll for the last decade has reflected a growing mistrust of all institutions in America from the news media to politicians to Wall Street.

People are watching, and people are losing faith because they are not being heard and not being served by the very people they elected to protect them.  Institutional inertia and governmental paralysis are unacceptable and Wall Street rip offs are the height of arrogance by a privileged class.

Why do 50% of eligible voters refuse to participate?  Why did a little over 20% of the eligible voters elect our last president?  Why are there more registered Independents than Democrats or Republicans, for the first time in our history?  Majority rule by the people is a joke because long ago Minority rule by Special Interest cast the people aside.

What is clear to the America people but not clear to the political and corporate establishment and politicians is the fact that the long talked about "Silent" or "Forgotten" majority is finally fed up and ready to fight back.       

Media Bias

Regarding media bias, those who say it does not exist are plain and simple liars.  Many studies of the media undertaken prove where the major media outlets stand in terms of bias.  Here are the results according to Pew Research.

So, we know there is extreme liberal media, the liberal media controls the vast majority of major media outlets, the liberal media are Democrats, and the people of America can be characterized as some liberal, some conservative, most in the middle, and they are Americans first!

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What happened to the news media in America - Have we returned to the era of Yellow Journalism?

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Do Journalists embrace ethics and avoid conflicts of interest?

Once upon a time, my favorite Scottish philosopher Edmund Burke in the 18th century coined the term "Fourth Estate" to describe the press.  It resulted from an attempt to distinguish the actions and interests of networked societies from those of the mass media.

By acting as a watchdog on other estates at the time, the First through Third Estates being clergy, nobility, and secular authorities, (the latter meaning civil law rather than religious law), the emerging profession of journalism elevated itself to the others' status and level.

Thanks to technology advances, we now have the term “Fifth Estate” to explain our collective ability to share information, to create communities, and to organize social movements through online networks.

With the proliferation of high-speed blabber in cyber space came the disintegration of truth and ethics.  Today, most people do not trust the news media no matter where it hides in society, as it seems to have lost its ethical foundation.

What is it in America that keeps our news media from being objective?

Have we returned to the era of "Yellow Journalism" in America?  You be the judge.

Quote by Joseph Pulitzer

Just what constitutes the era of Yellow Journalism re-emerging in America that dominated our newspapers in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

The "Yellow Fever" of Journalism

Yellow Journalism is a term first coined during the famous newspaper wars between the legendary publishers William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer II.

Pulitzer's paper, the New York World, and Hearst's New York Journal changed the content of newspapers adding more sensationalized stories and increasing the use of drawings and cartoons.

As newspapers published more and more cartoons, Pulitzer began to publish a cartoon of his own that he titled "The Yellow Kid" in 1896.  Created by R. F. Outcault, the cartoon became one of many objects fought over between Hearst and Pulitzer during their bitter and public rivalry.

Hearst later lured Outcault and his cartoon from Pulitzer by offering him an outrageous salary.  Pulitzer then published yet another version of the cartoon very similar to "The Yellow Kid" to continue competing with Hearst.

With so much competition between the newspapers, the news was over-dramatized and altered to fit story ideas that publishers and editors thought would sell the most papers and stir the most interest for the public so that news boys could sell more papers on street corners.

They often used the "Yellow Kid" cartoons to sensationalize stories and discredit the stories of other newspapers. Swaying public opinion on important issues such as the Spanish-American war was a frequent use of the cartoons.

Newspapers of the era did not practice the objectivity that newspapers and other news media supposedly strive for today.

The Society of Professional Journalists

The Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ), formerly known as Sigma Delta Chi, established in April 1909 at DePauw University, is one of the oldest organizations representing journalists in America.

The stated mission is to promote and defend the First Amendment guarantees of freedom of speech and freedom of the press; encourage high standards and ethical behavior in the practice of journalism; and promote and support diversity in journalism.

There are nearly 300 chapters across the United States with more than 9,000 members of the media.

Major SPJ initiatives include a Legal Defense Fund that wages court battles to secure First Amendment rights; the Project Sunshine campaign, to improve the ability of journalists and the public to obtain access to government records; producing the magazine Quill; and conducting the annual Sigma Delta Chi Awards, honoring excellence in journalism.

It has also drawn up a Code of Ethics to inspire journalists to adhere to high standards of behavior and decision-making while performing their work.

Here is the full text of the Code of Ethics for Professional Journalists.

Society of Professional Journalists

Code of Ethics

PREAMBLE

Members of the Society of Professional Journalists believe that public enlightenment is the forerunner of justice and the foundation of democracy. The duty of the journalist is to further those ends by seeking truth and providing a fair and comprehensive account of events and issues.

Conscientious journalists from all media and specialties strive to serve the public with thoroughness and honesty. Professional integrity is the cornerstone of a journalist’s credibility. Members of the Society share a dedication to ethical behavior and adopt this code to declare the Society’s principles and standards of practice.

SEEK TRUTH AND REPORT IT

Journalists should be honest, fair and courageous in gathering, reporting and interpreting information. Journalists should:

Test the accuracy of information from all sources and exercise care to avoid inadvertent error.

Deliberate distortion is never permissible.

Diligently seek out subjects of news stories to give them the opportunity to respond to allegations of wrongdoing.

Identify sources whenever feasible. The public is entitled to as much information as possible on sources’ reliability.

Always question sources’ motives before promising anonymity. Clarify conditions attached to any promise made in exchange for information. Keep promises.

Make certain that headlines, news teases and promotional material, photos, video, audio, graphics, sound bites and quotations do not misrepresent. They should not oversimplify or highlight incidents out of context.

Never distort the content of news photos or video. Image enhancement for technical clarity is always permissible. Label montages and photo illustrations.

Avoid misleading re-enactments or staged news events. If re-enactment is necessary to tell a story, label it.

 Avoid undercover or other surreptitious methods of gathering information except when additional open methods will not yield information vital to the public. Use of such methods should be explained as part of the story.

Never plagiarize.

Tell the story of the diversity and magnitude of the human experience boldly, even when it is unpopular to do so.

Examine their own cultural values and avoid imposing those values on others.

Avoid stereotyping by race, gender, age, religion, ethnicity, geography, sexual orientation, disability, physical appearance or social status.

Support the open exchange of views, even views they find repugnant.

Give voice to the voiceless; official and unofficial sources of information can be equally valid.

Distinguish between advocacy and news reporting. Analysis and commentary should be labeled and not misrepresent factor context.

Distinguish news from advertising and shun hybrids that blur the lines between the two.

Recognize a special obligation to ensure that the public’s business is conducted in the open and that government records are open to inspection.

MINIMIZE HARM

Ethical journalists treat sources, subjects and colleagues as human beings deserving of respect. Journalists should:

Show compassion for those who may be affected adversely by news coverage. Use special sensitivity when dealing with children and inexperienced sources or subjects.

Be sensitive when seeking or using interviews or photographs of those affected by tragedy or grief:

Recognize that gathering and reporting information may cause harm or discomfort. Pursuit of the news is not a license for arrogance.

Recognize that private people have a greater right to control information about themselves than do public officials and others who seek power, influence or attention. Only an overriding public need can justify intrusion into anyone’s privacy.

Show good taste. Avoid pandering to lurid curiosity.

Be cautious about identifying juvenile suspects or victims of sex crimes.

Be judicious about naming criminal suspects before the formal filing of charges.

Balance a criminal suspect’s fair trial rights with the public’s right to be informed.

ACT INDEPENDENTLY

Journalists should be free of obligation to any interest other than the public’s right to know. Journalists should:

Avoid conflicts of interest, real or perceived.

Remain free of associations and activities that may compromise integrity or damage credibility.

Refuse gifts, favors, fees, free travel and special treatment, and shun secondary employment, political involvement, public office and service in community organizations if they compromise journalistic integrity.

Disclose unavoidable conflicts.

Be vigilant and courageous about holding those with power accountable.

Deny favored treatment to advertisers and special interests and resist their pressure to influence news coverage.

Be wary of sources offering information for favors or money; avoid bidding for news.

BE ACCOUNTABLE

Journalists are accountable to their readers, listeners, viewers and each other. Journalists should:

Clarify and explain news coverage and invite dialogue with the public over journalistic conduct.

Encourage the public to voice grievances against the news media.

Admit mistakes and correct them promptly.

Expose unethical practices of journalists and the news media.

Abide by the same high standards to which they hold others.

About the Code of Ethics

The SPJ Code of Ethics is voluntarily embraced by thousands of journalists, regardless of place or platform, and is widely used in newsrooms and classrooms as a guide for ethical behavior.

The code is intended not as a set of “rules” but as a resource for ethical decision-making. It is not — nor can it be under the First Amendment — legally enforceable.

The present version of the code was adopted by the 1996 SPJ National Convention, after months of study and debate among the Society’s members. Sigma Delta Chi’s first Code of Ethics was borrowed from the American Society of Newspaper Editors in 1926. In 1973, Sigma Delta Chi wrote its own code, which was revised in 1984, 1987 and 1996.

So what do you think about the journalists of today?

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What have we learned from the Ferguson tragedy?

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After non-stop media bombardment in the countdown and release of the Grand Jury decision regarding the killing of Michael Brown, what is our 21st century lesson from what happened?

This may take a little time.

Our first lesson, we know bias and racism remain as underlining currents in America although anyone not knowing this lives in a bubble.

The bias exists between races, cultures, and even within races.  There is economic bias, class bias, opportunity bias, wealth bias, education bias, language bias, and a host of other biases that have nothing to do with race or color.

Then again, what can you expect in a nation that serves as a melting pot for all people of the world.  No other country in the world welcomes anyone and everyone like we do and when you get here, if you try to preserve your national culture, you are most likely biased.

Bias is such a monumental issue in America our founders made special provision in the Constitution and Bill of Rights to guarantee equal opportunity to everyone regardless of the prevailing biases.  They also made special provision in the Constitution and Bill of Rights to protect every American from any abuse resulting from such biases.  Finally, they established a system of justice to protect Americans abused because of bias.

On June 21, 1788, the Constitution was ratified.  We now have over 226 years of experience in enforcing the Constitution and we still have incidents of bias like the Ferguson, Missouri tragedy.

No doubt, we have come a long ways.  Way back when, only White landowners were citizens.  Minorities were not citizens, nor women regardless of color, nor all the immigrants we welcomed from around the world.  Not even the Original Americans were citizens.

Thanks to the Dutch, English and French, slaves came to America and they were not citizens.  When the Chinese came here to build the railroads, they were not citizens.  Nor were the Mexicans brought to harvest the American crops.

Even when we opened our doors to those fleeing desperate conditions, like the Irish potato famine, wars, unrest in Europe or Asia, the so-called Soviet crop failures, and the flight to escape Nazism, they received sanctuary yet had to earn American citizenship.         

I think bias may be a permanent human condition dictated by our programming throughout life and the culture in which we live.  If only we could learn to respect the biases of others perhaps, they could learn to respect ours and we could all live in harmony and peace.

Our second lesson, the media in America has lost its prestige that gave it special mention in the Bill of Rights.  Never was bias more apparent than in the media coverage of the Ferguson affair and few times in our history has the media led such an assault on our judicial system as the media reaction to the Grand Jury decision saying there was no probable cause for indicting the police officer, Darren Wilson, who shot Michael Brown.

For example, there is a ratings race between MSNBC and CNN and both cable networks have decided they have no chance to break the Fox News stranglehold on conservative and moderate America.  For well over a decade, FOX has dominated cable news with ratings two to ten times more than their competition.

That leaves the other two, MSNBC and CNN, in a dogfight to prove which is most liberal to the left wing extreme, so they have to out liberal each other.  What a shame since the liberals have not won a national election since, oh probably forever.

Lyndon Johnson and Franklin Roosevelt were about the most liberal presidents of the 20th century and they got us into the most devastating wars of our history, World War II and Viet Nam.  Indeed, they gave us the "New Deal" and "Great Society," but we also had the worst riots and urban warfare ever seen.

What is it about liberal movements that results in so much hate, disruption, and polarization?  Now that we have cable and national television networks fighting it out for the liberal spoils of ratings, we are right back in the midst of the discomfort zone.

Make no mistake; there are great liberal programs, services, and philosophies that benefit all people.  Yet just like with the conservatives, the good liberal programs were often hijacked by the lunatic fringe of the movement or were overshadowed by partisan polarization.

Social Security and Medicare have saved our older generation, whether conservatives or liberals.  Head Start is one of the few bright lights in the dismal performance of our education system.  Such liberal programs have distinguished America from other nations.

           

Liberal activists like Elizabeth Warren, when it comes to fighting Wall Street, are the only hope for ever curbing the abuses of wealth and power.  Yet, in order to secure the backing of the liberal media and liberal politicians, she and any other liberal must sell out many of the centrist principles of the real America to be part of the national debate.

Perhaps the greatest abuse of bias is obvious from the failure of the liberal media, when attempting to fan the ratings flames of the Ferguson tragedy, to acknowledge the existence of the toxicology report on Michael Brown on that fateful day.

A host of people and so-called experts are paraded before the cameras to tell us how flawed the grand jury system may be, or to discredit the testimony of the policeman regarding the condition of the victim Michael Brown.  When people have predetermined the outcome of a legal action, facts and truth have no role in the debate.

Well the fact is according to the toxicology report Michael Brown was stoned to a level equal to being drunk and incapable of driving.  So stoned on marijuana he walked into a store just before the incident, grabbed some boxes of cigars, and stormed out without paying.

Then walked down the middle of the street in broad daylight as if driving a car and not knowing which lane he occupied.  People do crazy things when they are stoned.  Charles Manson killed people.  Many others killed themselves.

The fact Michael Brown had a bag of pot in his possession indicated this was no first time use of drugs.  Why does the media refuse to expose the fact he may have been just another victim of drug abuse and when someone weighing 280 pounds is stoned, robbing stores, and walking down the middle of streets, perhaps they really are possessed by demons.

America needs to hear the rest of the story now hidden by the biased media.  We deserve the truth.  Then, we may be able to address the tragic conditions in our society that allow young men like Michael Brown to fall under the evil influence of drugs just like so many have fallen under the evil influence of another addiction, alcohol.

The full toxicology report story as contained in the Grand Jury documents is in the next CPT story about the Ferguson tragedy.

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